Unidentified Flying Objects (UFO)

Descriptions of UFOs have ranged from glowing wheels, to colored balls of light, to cigar-, disk-, or crescent-shaped objects. One of the first well-documented UFO sightings occurred in 1561 in Nuremberg, Germany. A broadsheet published that year describes red, blue and black balls or plates, crosses, and tubes that appeared to battle each other in the sky over the city.

The term flying saucer was coined in 1947. A business-man named Kenneth Arnold told reporters that while flying a private airplane near Mount Rainier in Washington State he saw nine objects flying over the mountain in formation and at a speed of more than 1,600 miles (2,500 kilometers) per hour. Arnold described the objects as moving like “a saucers across the water”. After that first report, Arnold’s description was shortened and it soon became popular to call all UFOs flying saucers.

Early Days of UFO History.

The United States government has records of thousands of UFO sightings, including photos of alleged UFOs and inter-views with people who claim to have seen them. Since UFOs were considered a potential security risk, the report on these sightings was originally classified as secret. When the report was later declassified it showed that 90 percent of all UFO sightings could be easily explained. Most of the sightings turned out to be celestial objects, such as stars or bright planets like Venus, or atmospheric events such as auroras or meteors falling through the atmosphere. Many other sightings turned out to be such objects as weather balloons, satellites, aircraft lights, or formation of birds. Often these sightings were accompanied by unusual weather conditions.

Projects on UFOs.

In 1948 the United States Air Force began the government’s first official UFO panel, Project Sign, which studied 243 sightings. It was replaced by Project Grudge, which investigated another 244 sightings. In March 1952 the most ambitious of the UFO panels, Project Blue Book, was organized by the Air Force. The panel employed a number of scientists, including physicists, engineers, meteorologists, and an astronomer. Project Blue Book had three main goals: to explain all reported sightings of UFOs; to decide if UFOs posed a threat to the national security of the United States; and to determine whether UFOs were using any advanced technology that the United States could use.

Increasing UFO Reports Amidst Increasing Concern.

By the mid-1960s UFO reports were more numerous than ever. For the first time they were coming in regularly from places outside the United States, including Canada, Sweden, the Soviet Union, and Australia. In February 1966 another UFO panel was convened. Like the others, this panel determined that the vast majority of UFO reports were either natural phenomena or outright hoaxes.

A few scientists publicly disagreed with the panel’s conclusions. This group, which included James E. McDonald, a meteorologist at the University of Arizona, and J.Alien Hynek, an astronomer at Northwestern University, maintained that since a few of the most reliable UFO reports had never been clearly explained, this was definite proof that Earth was being visited by extra-terrestrials.

Task 1

Match the pair of synonyms among the following words:

a).record, phenomenon, refer to, occur, battle, claim, turn out, study, goal, amidst, concern, convene, outright, maintain;

b). declare, among, write down, happen, event, worry, argue for, speak about, investigate, call to meet, completely, purpose, fight, take place.

Task 2

The following words appear in the text. Match each one with a definition on the right.

1. sighting 2. aerial 3. coin 4. formation 5. panel 6. hoax 7. classify 8. range from 9. skip 10. Aurora

a) move with quick steps and jumps b) a group of people gathered together to decide something c) something that one sees d) officially mark information top secret e) a group of people, ships, aircraft f) bands of colored light seen in the night sky g) inhabiting or occurring in the air h) invent (a word or phrase) i) to vary between limits j) a trick which makes someone believe something which is not true

Task 3

Are the following statements true or false? If false, say why. If true, add some more information.

1. Description of UFOs are numerous and varied.

2. One of the first described sightings happened in Europe in the XVI century.

3. The term “flying saucer” was invented by pilots and astronauts.

4. The information on UFOs, records, photos, report, etc. was always available to the public at large.

5. The nature of the most UFO sightings is quite unexplainable.

6. Very often uncommon weather conditions favor the appearance of strange lights and objects in the sky.

7. The US government considered the UFO problem to be of little importance.

8. By mid-1960s UFO report were coming in from many countries outside the USA.

9. In 1966 another UFO panel was called to meet for studying UFO reports.

Task 4